Beach Peanuts

Rick Scott Continues To Be Less Than Transparent About Zika Dangers

Having had to postpone his earlier Zika finger-pointing tour in Washington due to a hurricane, Rick Scott has rescheduled and is back at it there this week. No doubt the results will be just more of the blame game he's been playing while ignoring the fact that his party is the one holding up the funding request made by President Obama months and months ago. But there's plenty of blame to go around, much of it in Rick Scott's own back yard where many, many fingers can be pointed directly at him.

Now, once again, Scott is being less than transparent about Zika back home.

As The Miami Herald reports, while Scott has vowed to keep Floridians informed with accurate and timely information, that is hardly the case in reality:

But the information issued by the governor and state agencies has not been timely or accurate — cases announced as “new” are often several weeks old, because of a time lag in diagnosis — and excludes details that public health experts say would allow people to make informed decisions and provide a complete picture of Zika’s foothold in Florida.

“I don’t think the message has been strong enough, in terms of ‘We have a problem,’” said Arthur Caplan, director of medical ethics for New York University Langone Medical Center. “It makes no sense — unless you see it through the eyes of the impact on tourism. I think that’s money driving reporting rather than public health.”

Bingo.

 

Rick Scott always vowed to run the state like a business, and that he has. For him, business interests always come before the public's best interests no matter how much he professes to care about "Florida families," and this is no exception. After all, tourism is an industry, one that lines Scott's and Republican's pockets nicely. No doubt it would put a damper on theme park attendance unless you had a governor reassuring out-of-towners there's little to see here when it comes to danger and the Zika outbreak.

 

Among the fact and figure fudging:

 

Over the past month, as local Zika infections have spread beyond Miami-Dade, with cases cropping up in Broward, Palm Beach and Pinellas counties, Florida officials have:

▪ Stopped providing detailed information on epidemiological investigations into local Zika infections;

▪ Refused to identify all the locations where Zika-positive mosquitoes were trapped in Miami Beach;

▪ And under-reported the number of local Zika infections in Florida by excluding anyone who is not a state resident.

Not reporting local Zika infections to tourists is particularly egregious to Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

“That’s just wrong,” he said. “To get a true picture of what’s going on in Florida, you want to know, among anyone who was in Florida, who acquired it there. ... That’s how it should be counted. If they're not, then that sounds to me like they’re trying to minimize their number of cases.”

Wrong indeed.

 

And that's not the only thing that's wrong with Rick Scott's Zika disclosure problem. The pesticides Florida's using to combat the spread of the virus have been banned by the European Union for being a danger in itself. Still, you won't hear that from Rick Scott's Department of Health, but rather the contrary:

 

If Miami is going to stop the spread of Zika, residents have to trust that the government knows what it's doing. That's why it's all the more concerning that the Florida Department of Health last week published an outright lie in a Q&A about the virus and the pesticides being used to combat it.

As residents protested last week's decision by Miami-Dade County to spray naled, a controversial pesticide, over Miami Beach, the DOH last Thursday published a fact sheet titled "Frequently Asked Questions on Aerial Spraying of Naled."

Despite ample documentary evidence to the contrary, the DOH then claimed the pesticide is not banned in the European Union.

On page 2, the FAQ asks, "I heard naled is banned in Europe. Is that true?" It responds:

No that is not true. Since aerial application of adulticides for mosquito control in Europe is used very rarely, AMVAC, the company that sells naled, simply chose not to support the product under the EU Reregistration program. Since the product has not gone through the registration process to be approved for use, it cannot be used in Europe.

But that claim is demonstrably false. On May 11, 2012, the European Union announced it had evaluated naled and chose not to include it on its list of permitted pesticides.

It then goes on to say, in no uncertain terms, that an assessment conducted by French officials showed that naled posed an "unacceptable risk" to health and the environment. It added that tests did not show naled was effective enough to overcome the risks it posed.

 

As the Miami New Times points out, requests for comment on this from Scott's DOH have gone unanswered.

 

Because of course they have.

 

Meanwhile, Rick Scott is busy trying to blame the President for not sending him unlimited resources as the Republican Party continues to refuse the President's funding requests unless they're allowed to add poison pills that defund Planned Parenthood and allow the Confederate flag to fly.

 

 

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Florida's War On Women And The Poor Meets Zika

As of this writing, there are 69 pregnant women in Florida who have tested positive for the Zika virus. The virus first turned up in a south Florida neighborhood, then spread to Miami Beach and today has spread to Pinellas County.

What have Republicans done about it? Well, very little in fact.

Mosquito control in the state immediately became a victim of Rick Scott's war on "big government" soon after he came into office in 2011 when he cut funding. (It has since been discovered that he has an undisclosed financial interest in mosquito control through his wife, just as he signed an executive order in June of this year allocating $26.2 million in state emergency funds for Zika preparedness, including “mosquito surveillance and abatement." Whether any of those funds are going to his wife's company is  unknown and no one at the company is responding to questions about it.)

Since Zika became an issue, Republicans in Congress have blocked a Zika funding request from the President, who has had to use funds from elsewhere to fill the gap. Those funds are also running out, yet Congress is on a seven week vacation and there's little to indicate their stance on funding will change when they return. Still, that hasn't stopped politicians like Rick Scott, Marco Rubio and others from using GOP Zika inaction as a political football, in that they've played the blame game and kicked the excuses back at the President and Democrats anyway after they loaded a funding bill with poison pills aimed at further cuts to things like Planned Parenthood, one of the only places some women can afford access to reproductive health care.

For his part, Rick Scott first tried to minimize the urgency of the problem, but as it spread beyond the neighborhood of Wynwood, he got into a bout of grandstanding, according to Miami Beach and Miami-Dade County officials, who said Scott went public with information before notifying them.

Meanwhile, Rick Scott has "urged" pregnant women who are concerned about Zika to see their doctors. This is all well and good, except that Scott and Republicans have refused to expand Medicaid in Florida, have constructed hurdles to health care access in general, and have made access to abortion difficult. Scott's also gone after Planned Parenthood along with his party. So telling women to see their doctors doesn't help much if a good bit of the population of women in Florida are unable to see a doctor or can't afford to.

Then we have Marco Rubio, the Senator who made a career out of saying "no" to most anything that would benefit his constituents. He hates his job so much that he's running for it again after failing at a primary run for higher office and apparently not getting a better offer as a lobbyist. Or he would just prefer to continue getting paid for doing nothing at all in the Senate. He too tried to pin the blame on President Obama until Zika hit his home state. Now he's out pretending that he was all about Zika funding all along and is urging his GOP colleagues to pass the funding. This is an easy thing for him to do, considering everyone knows the chance of that happening is nil, so as usual, he's just talking a good game. 

And while trying to satisfy voters back home, Rubio also pretzeled in an incentive to the anti-abortion voter and donor crowd by saying that pregnant women who have contracted Zika should not get abortions, which is a sticky wicket indeed for his so-called "pro-life" cred. Rubio's also a big fan of cutting off access to health care, and considering Florida hasn't expanded Medicaid, that would leave an awful lot of women and children without health care and before, during, and after they've been hurt by the Zika virus. But Rubio's not at all concerned about that.

So here we've gone from the Republican Party doing their best to contribute to conditions favorable to Zika in Florida in the first place, to their blocking funding for Zika, to playing the blame game, and then finally sounding the alarm while knowing talk is cheap when their promises have no teeth, all the while making prevention and health care that much harder for women to gain access to.

It's just business as usual by the do-nothing GOP.

And while they continue to do nothing, or very little, Zika's not going anywhere.

That's 42 cases of local Florida Zika transmission, 69 pregnant women with Zika, and counting. 

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Rick Scott Tries To Minimize Zika Threat As Feds Warn Off Pregnant Women

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has warned pregnant women not to travel to Florida in areas where the Zika virus has been found. This comes after the virus was found to have spread to Miami Beach. The virus was previously found only in the Wynwood neighborhood in Miami:

Federal health authorities suggested Friday that pregnant women and their partners consider postponing travel to all of Miami-Dade County after Florida identified a second zone of local Zika transmission, a swath of Miami Beach that includes the popular tourist magnet of South Beach.

Pregnant women should not travel to that particular zone where the Zika virus is active, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, and “pregnant women and their sexual partners who are concerned about potential Zika virus exposure may also consider postponing nonessential travel to all parts of Miami-Dade County.”

Because of the nature of virus and its absence of symptoms and the incubation period, the C.D.C. warns that the restricted areas may not be limited to just Wynwood and Miami Beach. 

But while the feds are sounding the alarm, Rick Scott, who has continued to encourage tourists to visit Florida, is trying to minimize the threat:

“We have two small areas,” he said. “One less than a mile, and we’ve already been able to reduce the footprint. We have another area now that’s 1.5 miles on Miami Beach. That’s out of a state that takes 15 hours to drive from Key West to Pensacola, so let’s put things in perspective.”

Given that until recently Scott had little interest in worrying about Zika beyond trying to somehow blame GOP Congressional inaction on President Obama, I'd trust the feds on this one.

As you'll recall, the President asked for Zika funding months ago, but instead, Republicans blocked it and are currently taking a seven week vacation while they ignore it.

For his part, Scott cut funding for mosquito control not long after taking office, in that it was merely another "big government" intrusion. Never mind that another "big government" intrusion he favored was signing abortion restrictions into law that also impede Zika research. He also had a hand in blocking Medicaid in particular and health care in general.

In spite of the Zika threat, Scott has continued to push tourism in the state despite the potential health dangers. In fact, just days ago he issued a press release bragging about an all-time high in Florida tourism. In that press release, there's no mention of Zika to be found.

Since he prefers to run government like a business, it's hardly surprising he would seek to minimize health dangers when they might cut into the bottom line of the tourism industry that cuts him some pretty hefty campaign checks on a regular basis.

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Let's Dispel Once And For All With This Fiction That Marco Rubio Is "Pro-Life"

Marco Rubio loves to tout his so-called "pro-life" badge of honor. When it comes to women making decisions about their own bodies and health care, Rubio inserts himself between them and their doctors to inform them that while they may think they know what's best for themselves, he prefers to "err on the side of life" and make that decision for them.

Rape, incest, a life of pain and suffering, none of this matters to Rubio. When it comes to abortion, he prefers to err on the side of life no matter what the cost to the mother and the child. Rubio thinks that the decisions of a pregnant woman are best left up to him.

Now, in light of the Zika outbreak that's hit his home state, he's taken it a step further. You see, Marco Rubio has now decided that even if a pregnant woman is infected with the Zika virus, which in turn causes her child to be born with microcephaly, he who would be the boy king of gynoticians believes that these woman shouldn't be allowed to get an abortion.

Because he says so.

This is the same guy who would force a 15-year-old to give birth because, while it may well be a "hard situation" for that pregnant teenager, he personally prefers to err on the side of life with said forced birth.

Because he says so.

The same guy who says even if a woman's pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, HE will err on the side of life and force that woman to give birth anyway.

Because he says so.

President Obama asked Congress to pass a Zika funding bill months ago, yet Republicans have blocked it by trying to use it to defund Planned Parenthood, because their absurdities and hypocrisy know no bounds.

In spite of that, Rubio has joined a chorus of Republicans who are trying to snow the public and blame the President and Democrats for the GOP's obstruction. Rather than passing the funding which is needed more every day as Zika cases mount, Republicans decided a seven week vacation for them was more important than Zika funding.

Rubio isn't just a pro-life hypocrite when it comes to abortion. He's also a pro-life hypocrite when it comes to health care. He's a proud member of the Let's Kill Obamacare Club, and he hails from a Republican controlled state that not only tried to make Obamacare harder to get, but which also said no to Medicaid. (The same Governor Rick Scott, who had a hand in all of the above, also tried to kill Planned Parenthood in Florida. He also cut funding to mosquito control when he first got into office, because  it was one of the evils of "Big Government." Those mosquitos are now spreading the Zika virus to pregnant women in Florida, because freedom!)

While Rubio is busy proclaiming to anyone who will listen that he's "erring on the side of life," he conveniently leaves out the fact that those women infected with Zika he's demanding give birth to babies who will be born with microcephaly will be in dire need of health care. So much health care in fact, that the CDC can't even begin to calculate the potentially staggering costs yet.

Yet the cost of caring for that child for the the rest of its life is only part of it.

This is the kind of life Rubio would be sentencing a child born with microcephaly to, according to the CDC:

Microcephaly is a condition where a baby’s head is much smaller than expected. During pregnancy, a baby’s head grows because the baby’s brain grows. Microcephaly can occur because a baby’s brain has not developed properly during pregnancy or has stopped growing after birth, which results in a smaller head size. Microcephaly can be an isolated condition, meaning that it can occur with no other major birth defects, or it can occur in combination with other major birth defects.

Severe microcephaly is a more serious, extreme form of this condition where a baby’s head is much smaller than expected. Severe microcephaly can result because a baby’s brain has not developed properly during pregnancy, or the brain started to develop correctly and then was damaged at some point during pregnancy.

Babies with microcephaly can have a range of other problems, depending on how severe their microcephaly is. Microcephaly has been linked with the following problems:

• Seizures
• Developmental delay, such as problems with speech or other developmental milestones (like sitting, standing, and walking)
• Intellectual disability (decreased ability to learn and function in daily life)
• Problems with movement and balance
• Feeding problems, such as difficulty swallowing
• Hearing loss
• Vision problems

These problems can range from mild to severe and are often lifelong. Because the baby’s brain is small and underdeveloped, babies with severe microcephaly can have more of these problems, or have more difficulty with them, than babies with milder microcephaly. Severe microcephaly also can be life-threatening. Because it is difficult to predict at birth what problems a baby will have from microcephaly, babies with microcephaly often need close follow-up through regular check-ups with a healthcare provider to monitor their growth and development.

And Zika doesn't just pose risks for babies. There's also a possible link between Zika and Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS).

So while Rubio would "prefer to err on the side of life" merely to score a few votes and political points among the anti-abortion types, the anti-Obamacare and the say no to Medicaid types, he'll never have to face the real life consequences those lives he wants to play God with will. 

Nope. Rubio wants to score votes and political points and play with people's lives just so he can go back to the Senate job he admits he hates.

The job he still gets paid for even though he rarely shows up for work.

The "big government" job that provides him and his family with his own sweet federal health care subsidy courtesy of the same taxpayer he wants to deny those same benefits.

"Pro-life?"

No, Marco Rubio is pro-Marco Rubio, and he deserves to lose this election just as badly as Donald Trump does. The man who also sees Zika as an "insignificant issue," the man Rubio once said was unfit to hold office, but who he's now endorsing and going to bat for.

Marco Rubio and the Republicans who ignored the Zika outbreak and blocked funding for it are anything but "pro-life," and every baby born with microcephaly will now become a visual symbol of that fact.

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Florida Republicans Took A Bite Out Of Mosquito Control And Enabled A Zika Outbreak

As a Zika outbreak hits South Florida, Republicans are trying to deflect blame for their inaction, from the entire party's obstruction in Congress, to Marco Rubio, to Rick Scott. While Congress took several more weeks of vacation instead of addressing Zika, Rubio and Scott are pretending to have a sudden interest in the problem. Both have even tried to blame the President, who asked for funding from Congress months ago but was ignored.

Nice try.

While we can't know if the problem could have been prevented, Republicans in Florida have done their part to pave an easier path for a Zika outbreak as well.

In 2013, Mother Jones published a detailed article on how the Tea Party and Rick Scott devastated "big government" in Florida by doing away with things like infrastructure (turning away funding for a high-speed rail project that was years in the making), refusing Medicaid expansion, throwing up roadblocks to Obamacare, cutting water supply programs, and more.

Among the things that got axed as tax dollars went instead to corporations and were used as "incentives" for jobs, many of which never materialized, was a program that would have come in handy right about now.

Mosquito control: 

It used to be that a few government expenditures were immune from partisan disagreement—cops, potholes, mosquito control. But not anymore. Most of Florida's mosquito abatement work is done at the local level, where independent taxing districts are responsible for the bulk of the eradication efforts. These districts have become targets of tea party wrath. Last year, a trio of conservative activists dubbing themselves the "Mosquitoteers" challenged several members on the Anastasia Mosquito Control Board in St. Augustine. They campaigned on a plan to cut mosquito control taxes and the district's budget and bought a billboard reading: "Smash mosquitoes and the friends of Obama." Never mind, notes board member Vivian Browning, that the seats are nonpartisan: "Mosquitoes, they don't care if you're Republican, Democrat, or independent. They can eat you, infect you, kill you, regardless of party." One of the Mosquitoteers, a reserve sheriff's deputy, defeated a University of Florida biology professor who is an expert in mosquito-borne diseases—a concern in a state that has regular outbreaks of West Nile virus and has seen an uptick in dengue fever.

The state Legislature has also done its part to liberate mosquitoes from the shackles of big government. In 2011, the Republican-dominated Legislature slashed the state's contribution to mosquito control by 40 percent. Florida A&M University closed one of two major mosquito research labs in the state after the Legislature axed $500,000 in research funds. Public health officials succeeded in restoring money to keep the lab open, only to see Scott kill it with a stroke of his veto pen. Along with other budget cuts, the closure halved the number of Florida scientists working on mosquito control.

"There's maybe a perfect storm of sorts," says Joseph Conlon, a technical adviser to the American Mosquito Control Association in Florida. "You've got the government rightfully trying to cut budgets across the board, but down here in Florida, the place would be uninhabitable without mosquito control."

....Florida's internationally renowned mosquito control system took a half century to build, but only three years to decimate. Likewise with public health, says Nan Rich, who fought the cuts in the state Senate: "The infrastructure is being destroyed and responding to public health crises becomes more difficult," she says. "I shudder to think if what happened with Hurricane Sandy had happened here."

Yes, responding to a public health crisis like Zika without the needed infrastructure in place is something we no longer have to imagine, thanks to Republicans in the legislature and Rick Scott. And thanks to Marco Rubio and the rest of his party in Washington who are standing in the way of funding, plan B isn't going so well either.

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Lack Of Pest Control Threatens Florida

Marco Rubio is busy trying to muddy the waters after his party has blocked funding for Zika for months, and continues to do so as they're taking an overextended vacation in spite of an outbreak in Florida.

Rubio's late to the game as always, but now that he sees possible political problems for himself given that Zika has landed in his hometown, he's calling for action while deflecting blame for his party's inaction in the first place.

Meanwhile, since he's also thrown his full support behind Donald Trump, he's dancing around another potential political land mine.

The Trump campaign sees Zika as an "insignificant issue."

Juan Fiol, the Trump campaign’s vice chairman in Miami-Dade County, where Rubio lives, recently bashed Clinton for discussing the issue and said her campaign was “sophomoric” for “taking on such an insignificant issue,” according to The Boston Globe, which also couldn’t reach Hicks.

“We have bigger mosquitoes to squash than Zika — like ISIS, the national debt, Iraq, and Afghanistan,” Fiol told the Boston Globe. “We have a wall to build to keep the illegals out. We have so many other issues that are more important than this.”

Right. Building a great wall to keep out all those imaginary "illegals" that only right-wing Conservatives can see flooding into the country is so much more important than an actual public health crisis happening now. And let's don't forget about Trump's other "bigger mosquitos to squash" that Rubio's willing to overlook, like lashing out at dead veterans families, or trying to figure out what the downsides of using nuclear weapons are.

It's nice that Rubio is calling for some sort of action on Zika, but again, he waited to do so until it came back to bite him politically, if you will, which is usually what it takes to get his attention. His party has blocked the Zika funding President Obama asked Congress for months ago, and when Democrats tried to push funding through, Rubio's party tacked on things like measures to defund Planned Parenthood, an organization that offers things like contraception and abortions, something that women who may become pregnant or already are when they contract the virus just might need.

Marco Rubio and his party have long treated Zika as a political football, and thus seemingly an "insignificant issue," and it's hardly a surprise that it hasn't even been on their nominee's radar.

Maybe if Rubio had bothered to care before now, this wouldn't have become just another reminder that Marco Rubio was an absentee Senator when his constituents needed him most.

What makes anyone think that will change if he's reelected for the job he says hates and rarely shows up to do?

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As Zika Spreads In Florida, State's New Abortion Laws Also Block Research

What You Don't Know Can Hurt You

Republicans in Florida use phrases like "safety of women's health" and "protecting life" as a hammer when pounding anti-abortion bills through the Legislature, as does Rick Scott as he happily signs them into law. But you'd have to be living under a rock to know that these laws and the women and children they hurt are nothing more than political footballs used to keep their anti-abortion zealots at bay. 

The latest anti-abortion law signed last week adds a new layer of hypocrisy to the "cause" of protecting life, and it adds yet another danger for pregnant women and their babies:

The Zika virus.

Florida is also among the states at greatest risk from the virus, which is carried by a species of mosquito endemic to the Gulf Coast. It's also a major travel hub for the Caribbean and South American, where the virus has already broken out. Recommended travel restrictions from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have extended ever northward as the temperatures have warmed. This month, the agency warned against pregnant women going to Cuba, just 90 miles south of the Florida Keys.

The obvious risk involving the state's restrictive anti-abortion laws is making it harder for women to get an abortion when they know or suspect they've been exposed to the virus, and the life of babies who will be born with defects as a result. But the laws go even further now as they also block the very research needed to combat Zika:

Scientists say such laws in states like Florida, Arizona, Ohio and Indiana — along with an escalating probe of fetal tissue research by House Republicans — are becoming roadblocks to the research needed to combat Zika. But the reaction has been muted because scientists fear the wrath of anti-abortion activists, even though many say the research is urgent to find the answers that could save children from birth defects or death.

“Basically the only insights we’ve had so far on Zika is with patients who have either lost a pregnancy or had miscarriages,” said Patrick Ramsey, an obstetrician at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. “This is a situation where the vaccine is going to have to protect the mom and protect the baby. Fetal tissue is going to be needed to look at the effects.”

Fetal tissue research was the target of the anti-abortion fanatics who deceptively edited vides from Planned Parenthood to make it falsely appear that PP was "selling baby parts" last summer, and even though the videos were proved to be false and the group was charged with a crime as the result of making them, Republicans have continued to pretend they're valid in order to enact laws like this one. And despite the fact that PP in Florida doesn't donate fetal tissue, the latest law signed by Scott last week prohibits the donation of fetal tissue and will hamper efforts in preventive research to combat Zika by cutting off scientists access to fetal tissue used in the research.

Two of the lead sponsors of the latest attack on women and children's health tooled through anti-abortion laws, Rep. Colleen Burton and Sen. Kelli Stargel, both Republicans, have hidden behind empty talking points used against the very women and children they claim they're protecting. 

While cutting off many women's access to any health care through Planned Parenthood clinics the law basically defunded, Burton claimed that women could easily get health care elsewhere. To "prove it" she provided a list of other facilities they could turn to. However, the list contained everything from dental offices to elementary schools. Obviously this is a ridiculous argument and Burton had no shame making it.

Burton's argument against allowing a women to donate fetal tissue for research (remember, PP clinics in Florida never offered that option) for things like the Zika virus was equally empty:

“Our concern in Florida is that a woman’s decision to donate [fetal tissue] is made at the same time she is also making a decision to have an abortion, and there was no public good in her needing to make that decision, too,” Burton said.

Remember Burton's claim that there is "no public good" that can come of women being able to make this decision as Zika spreads throughout the state and the country, as it likely will, absent the research she and her fellow Republicans have blocked.

As for Sen. Kelli Stargel, her excuse was this:

"What we did with these clinics is just treat them similar to other surgery centers."

Among the restrictions Stargel says "are similar to other surgery centers" under the new law is the requirement of annual inspection of clinics by health authorities and tightened rules on disposal of aborted fetal tissue. 

As Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood put it, "this cruel bill is designed to rip health care away from those most at risk."

Along with blocking basic health care to women, by blocking abortions, the law virtually sentences children born with the Zika virus to a life of pain and suffering. Of course, while Florida has also blocked Medicaid expansion, not to mention access to affordable health care for many, and health care and insurance altogether from those who can't afford it, they have also cut off avenues to any type of safety net, which will leave those mothers and their children without the care they need. Because "pro-life!"

It's a virtual nightmare domino effect scenario, and as Zika spreads throughout the state, not only will we have Rick Scott, Colleen Burton, Kelli Stargel and their Republican colleagues to thank for it, we can also thank those who are not elected officials, nor doctors, but nonetheless are making these life and death for women and children in Florida, like John Stemberger, president of Florida Family Policy Council, who congratulated all involved, who called it a "historic victory."

“We are so grateful to the Republican leadership in the Florida House and Florida Senate for making this happen,” Stemberger said, citing the sponsorship of the legislation by Sen. Kelli Stargel and Rep. Colleen Burton, both Republicans from Lakeland. “They collectively did what the governor failed to do, namely, provided leadership on this critical issue and made it happen.”

Or like Ingrid Delgado of the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops, who said of the new law

"It is incomprehensible that opponents suggest the bill makes women less safe."

All this from the Republican Party who said they "didn't want to come between you and your doctor" as an excuse to block the Affordable Care Act. Now the party and those you never elected are not only coming between you and your doctor if you're a women seeking an abortion, they're coming between you and the researcher trying to combat the Zika virus even if you're not.

Do you feel safer and more protected yet, Florida?

(Photo: CDC.gov)

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